Chapter 158 - Lightsaber Duel

Dageer and Ragout looked over the ledge, and saw Ventress jumping down from one rock to another. The soldier aimed his DC-15A at her, but before he could fire, Dageer saw dozens of red lasers coming for him.

He ducked, and barely escaped the onslaught of lasers. Clanckers didn't have a good aim, but when hundreds of them fired at the same time, there was little a clone could do. And that was exactly what was happening right now. The droids that still had to enter the C-9979 lined up in front of Ventress, protecting her with their bodies.

General Di approached them, and pulled both the clone and his padawan back using the Force. Dageer felt his body being dragged gently, which, compared to how Ventress used the Force on him, was quite peculiar.

The Jedi's robes were utterly battered, with many cuts, although the Nikto didn't look like he was hurt.

"We are going back to the ship. There is nothing we can do here."

Ragout looked grudgingly at the droids below, and turned away. The group went back the way they came, but it would still take hours for them to get back to where the corvette landed.

"Shep, I am transmitting our location to you. Come pick us up. There should be a place where you can land about ten kilometers from here."

Shep was the pilot of the CR90 Corvette. When Dageer was informed that Hell Squad would be the only ones to accompany General Di, he tried to convince the Jedi to bring an ARC-170 escort, more specifically, Steel Battalion, the best pilots in the 303rd. The Jedi, however, said that they would attract too much attention, and denied Dageer's request. As such, all Dageer could do was bring Shep, who was the top pilot of large spacecraft.

"Yes, sub-commander."

Ten kilometers were nothing for the two Jedis, and Hell Squad had the best physical training a soldier could have. In less than an hour, they arrived at the rendezvous location, but the corvette was nowhere to be seen. Dageer knew that they would have to wait at least another half an hour because of all the preparations necessary to take off.

"General, Shep should be here in forty minutes. Do we keep going or wait?"

General Di stopped to ponder. If they kept running, the ship might not find a place good enough to land, and that could be their doom. But if they stopped here, it was almost certain that the droids would catch up to them. At last, the Jedi showed some boulders to Dageer.

"We will wait here. Move these boulders, try to create a barricade of some sort. Enough for you to have some cover. The droids will most certainly attempt a frontal assault since they outnumber us. Hell Squad will have to hold them back until Shep arrives. Ragout and I will take care of Ventress."

"Yes, general. Dab, stay on overwatch. If a seppie appears, shoot first, then warn us, understood?"

"With pleasure, sir."

Dab found a rock slightly bigger than the others, and rested his DC-15x on it, his eyes scanning the mountains and paths for any signs of droids. Meanwhile, the rest of Hell Squad started pulling over boulders to create a primitive wall.

After twenty minutes, the six clones, with small help of the Jedis to move some bigger rocks, had created a barricade about one meter tall, a dozen meters long. It was small, but better than nothing, and they finished right on time.

They heard the droids before they saw them, and Dageer quickly ordered Hell Squad to take position behind the barricade. A few seconds later, the first shot from Dab's DC-15x echoed.

To maximize the surprise, Dab had even fired one of his charged shots. The modifications that Dab made on his blasters were unusual, but usually came in handy, as they did now. Before the clanckers even discovered they were being attacked, at least a dozen of them were blasted to pieces. Of course, a dozen in an army of hundreds wasn't much, but it was a good start.

As one of the top units amongst the entire Republic Army, Hell Squad's abilities were way better than ninety-nine percent of the clones. The only ones that could compare to them were other special units, clone commandos, and ARC troopers. As such, none of the members of Hell Squad missed a shot when they fired the first volley.

To get to the clones, the droids had to walk through a gorge, which limited their lines to about twenty to twenty-five clanckers, shoulder to shoulder. The first shot from Dab had already depleted their vanguard, and Hell Squad took care of the remaining twelve before the second line could even understand what was going on.

Each of the blue lasers found their mark, either on the head or chest of the B1 units. Such accuracy, considering that the droids were about two hundred and fifty meters away, and that they weren't using sharpshooters blasters, but DC-15As and DC-15Ss, was enough to earn Hell Squad's members the role of snipers on a legion.

Back to the combat, the droids continued their inexorable attack on Hell Squad's position. About a hundred clanckers had died, and the most Hell Squad suffered was a scratch on Brain's shoulder.

As much as Dageer would like to say it was all because of his squad's abilities, General Di and his padawan played a large part in it. At least half of the droid kills had been by their hands.

However, now, they were too occupied to deal with the droids. The duo of master and apprentice were fighting Ventress once again, and the droids, instead of trying to intervene, opened space for them to fight. Probably, Dageer thought between one laser and the other, because of Ventress' pride, she couldn't let her army help her.

Still, she was fighting the two of them on equal grounds. When one of them attacked, she used one lightsaber to parry, and the other to counterattack. More than once, Ragout barely escaped the red lightsaber, and on one occasion, the lightsaber cut through his robes, not hitting him by millimeters.

Suddenly, Ventress disengaged. Dageer, who had been paying close attention to the fight, in case any of the generals needed help, switched his aim from one of the droids to Ventress. She was about to pounce on Ragout, who had his guard open, but then she sensed danger.

Without looking, she deflected the blue laser, hitting an unlucky droid sergeant. However, she had stopped her movement, giving Ragout the chance to get his guard back up. Ventress threw a vicious stare at Dageer, but all she received were two more lasers, which she dodged.

Seeing the three Force-wielding beings start battling against, Dageer shifted his attention back to the approaching droids.

"Brain, prepare your detonators!"

His second-in-command pulled three thermal detonators from his belt, and threw them to Dageer and Three-four. When the clanckers approached a few more meters, they launched the detonators. And a sudden explosion engulfed the battle, destroying hundreds of droids.